Race Expert is a new too market horse racing tipster service from the Premium Sports Tipsters team. The service provides a comprehensive look at the days racing advising of numerous bets with advice coming from tipster Tony Marsh.
Introduction to Race Expert
I have often lamented the fact that when it comes to tipster services, a frustrating number of tipsters are incredibly keen to provide about the barest minimum that they can. A point that Premium Sports Tipsters are seemingly incredibly aware of, as their marketing for today’s subject outright states “More Than The Name of A Horse and The Time of A Race!”. The fact of the matter is that if you are paying good money for a tipster service, it isn’t unreasonable to expect more than that most basic of information.
This is something that is seemingly being addressed here with Race Expert. A tipster service that is, in many ways, much more than just a tipster service. And this is in no small part down to the fact that you receive so much more than just the name of a horse and the time of a race from Tony Marsh. Honestly, it is conceptually exciting to see tipster stables like Premium Sports Tipsters looking to produce something new and more in depth than the typical offering. Especially because it simply carries the potential to open new doors for punters.
Of course, all of the best will in the world doesn’t really count for much if a service isn’t producing a profit. And this is an area where I think Race Expert is contentious. Now, that doesn’t mean that you should switch off at this point. There is a lot of ground to cover and a lot to talk about in terms of results. It really isn’t black and white, but it is important to discuss. So, with that in mind, I will get straight to it.
What Does Race Expert Offer?
By far and away the single most impressive elements of Race Expert come from the logistical elements. Normally when you talk about a tipster service, you offer up what you can here, but it typically boils down to “get email, place bets, hopefully profit”. As I said, there is so much focus in this industry on doing what is seemingly the minimum requirements. Not so here though.
What Race Expert is based around instead of simple “direct tips” is really more of a newsletter, almost. Here, Tony Marsh breaks down the days racing. Every day produces a multiple page race guide which looks at a variety of different things (which I want to cover in detail a little bit later on). Now, one of the things that is a little bit contentious about something like this is the question of what you do with the information.
Ultimately, there are just two tips that Tony Marsh provides each day. And that is all that Premium Sports Tipsters proof. However, there is potentially an argument to be made that there are even more bets that you could look to take advantage of if you were so inclined. Obviously, some people will be more or less comfortable doing this, but I don’t think it is necessarily a bad thing.
Just whilst I’m wrapping up on the logistical elements, I want to mention something that I consider to be quite important. Tony Marsh typically sends out his selections for Race Expert around 9pm. That is a very good thing, giving you plenty of time to consider the analysis and decide if there are any additional horses that you might think are worth backing as well. Furthermore, you can ensure that you are securing the best possible value.
Which brings me rather nicely to the topic of odds and the bets themselves. Now, before I get into those odds, I think it is quite important to talk about the actual bets that are advised. I mentioned earlier that there are actually only two tips per day. These are Tony Marsh’s nap of the day, and a daily each way selection. These are of course greatly different approaches to betting, but they can potentially work well together.
As you would expect, the nap of the day tends to be much lower odds. These sometimes get as high as 5.0, but this is definitely a rarity. Meanwhile, the odds for the each way bets are much much higher. Frequently, you are backing horses that are in double digit odds going as high as 30/1. All of this results in average odds of 9.48, however, this isn’t at all representative of what you are getting (a point I want to come to a little later on).
In many respects, this is ultimately a very low volume tipster service, however, I think setting up a betting bank for Race Expert does warrant more being set aside than you might expect. The fact of the matter is that whilst you are only placing a theoretical two bets per day, there may be other horses in the guides that catch your eye. And if I were following something along the lines of this, I would definitely want to budget for those additional costs.
Whilst we’re touching on betting banks, I do like the fact that Tony Marsh uses a simple level staking plan of 1 point per bet. Far too often with something like Race Expert, things are overcomplicated and tipster stables like Premium Sports Tipsters can be guilty of inflating results with huge bets that no reasonable person is placing. But that isn’t the case here.
The final thing that I want to talk about is the strike rate here. Premium Sports Tipsters’s proofing shows strike rate of 37.85%. Which seems commendable when you look at those average odds. This does however include each way bets placing (which can produce profits of less than half a point). This really highlights the importance of keeping things in context when looking at results for a tipster service.
How Does Race Expert Work?
Premium Sports Tipsters claim that Tony Marsh is a “horse racing statistician and form guru who has been involved in racing from a very young age and quite simply has lived and breathed racing for over 35 years!”. An impressive enough claim, and one that I think it is difficult to prove or disprove. Furthermore, we are told that he uses “tried and tested statistics and form building techniques” when finding selections.
I do like the fact that this gives you some idea of what Race Expert is based on. Whilst it isn’t the most in depth analysis, you aren’t coming into this entirely blind. Of course, when you actually receive your daily tips from Tony Marsh, that is where you really get to understand the approach. Tony Marsh provides brief writeups explaining his thoughts and why a horse has been selected or a race.
Let’s be honest, you don’t get much better insight than quite literally being told in clear terms why a horse has been selected. This is very welcome and whilst it is new to Premium Sports Tipsters, I have seen it done with other tipster service. I also consider it to be the “gold standard” for a tipster, and I would love to see more of this level of detail.
And as always, I want to point to the very comprehensive proofing that Premium Sports Tipsters provide. Even if you have doubts about Race Expert, there is no denying the fact that having a comprehensive breakdown of bets gives you some additional idea of what to expect. It gives you a very good overview of performance, which is a good thing in this specific case, for reasons that I will come to shortly.
What is the Initial Investment?
I’ll be blunt here. Race Expert isn’t exactly cheap. Not without paying out a lot of money. Premium Sports Tipsters have three different options available if you want to sign up to Tony Marsh’s tips. All of these differ drastically in terms of cost and overall value. The “cheapest” option is a monthly subscription. This is priced at £40 per month which is inclusive of VAT.
There is better value to be had in a quarterly subscription which is priced at £80 every 3 months. The best value (by a comfortable margin) also comes with the most expense. This is a 6 monthly subscription which is priced at £120.
Whichever option you go in for, it is noteworthy that there is no real money back guarantee in place. This means that if you want to take advantage of that better value, you really need to be willing to stick with it. With that said, at the time of writing this, Premium Sports Tipsters are offering your first subscription period half price across all subscriptions.
What is the Rate of Return?
On the surface of things, Race Expert has performed reasonably well. At the time of writing, the overall profit to BOG stands at 249.36 points. Given that this is over a 15 month period (factoring in that there was no racing in April and May last year), I don’t think it is a terrible result. Some 16 points per month is respectable, as is the ROI at 31.85%. Even to SP where Tony Marsh’s performance is at its lowest, you’re still looking at 185 points and an ROI of 23.63%.
With that said, it is time to address the biggest problem that I have with Race Expert. Since racing restarted in June, there has been a profit of just 76.14 points. Around 7.6 points per month. That is quite slow progress which is punctuated by 4 losing months. They weren’t huge losses (the biggest was 8.98 points), but losses none the less. Meanwhile, the average ROI almost halves to a little under 16%.
Conclusion for Race Expert
Honestly, I really wanted to like Race Expert. Hell, I would even go as far as to say that in some ways, I still do. I can really respect what Tony Marsh and Premium Sports Tipsters have set out to achieve here, and in many respects, I feel like they probably have done just that. To go back to that headline, this is a service that is definitely more than the name of a horse and the time of a race.
Of course, the fact that I like something doesn’t always mean that it will warrant a recommendation. And having written that statement, which sums up so much, it is quite hard to explain why that is. Really, I think it all comes down to a few key points about Race Expert, and most of those are based around the fact that it is a very nuanced thing.
First of all, let’s talk about those profits. Whilst there have been dips, ultimately, Race Expert has been on an upwards trajectory in terms of the profit and loss. But it has been almost glacial in its pace. There have been a few decent months but these have always been impacted by the losing months. But again, there is still an upwards trajectory. So that’s something.
On top of that, there is the potential to increase your profit potential by simply increasing the number of bets that you cover. As I mentioned, Tony Marsh advises just his nap of the day and an each way selection, but Race Expert is a complete betting resource. And if you really want to be getting the most out of it, you should probably be looking to take advantage of that other advice. Even if it isn’t a “tip”.
Which brings me to the topic of value. If you were to look at Race Expert solely as a tipster service based on Tony Marsh’s results, I would say that it is very bloody expensive. Whilst £40 per month is definitely towards the lower end of what I would expect to pay for a tipster service, it is a lot of money for one with this kind of performance. But what Premium Sports Tipsters are doing here is about more than just the performance of those two tips. So it’s a bit harder to gauge.
Here’s the bottom line for me. Make no mistake that whilst I like what Tony Marsh and Premium Sports Tipsters are doing here, and I really respect their vision, I’m not certain this is worth recommending at the moment. Mostly because I just don’t think the results are quite consistent enough. However, that doesn’t mean that I see this as a complete write off either.
The fact is that there is some value to Race Expert by virtue of what it sets out to do. And honestly, if Tony Marsh can get back to the consistency he was showing before the first lock down, this is a guaranteed no brainer. But unfortunately, as it stands, Race Expert just isn’t performing well enough to justify a £40 per month cost in my book.
